[andyt]

Choban Choban:

I'm sure if Mom and Dad had to pay up $100 everytime their kid hit someone things would change.

I'm not so sure at all. To what ages would you apply this? 6 yr olds giving each other a smack? Two 14 yr olds having a consensual fight? Or are you going to call out CSI each time to fully investigate the incident before giving the ticket. Things are often not so clear as this case.

[BartSimpson]

andyt andyt:

And where things are probably worse today is with with gangs - ie being bullied by a whole group. Hard to stand up to that by yourself.

Not at all.

Every group has a leader or a mouthpiece. Identify him (or her, as it may be), and then perform a very savage blitz attack when such a thing is least expected. Get him on the ground and continue the attack until someone drags you away. (That last part leaves a very important and lasting psychological impact).

Now you've sent a message to the weaker members of the group that you can isolate them and hurt them. Be sure to remind them of this fact as needed.

I know that works because that's what got me through high school.

My first two years in high school were hell.

In the first two months of my junior year I went on the warpath and after that I didn't have any more serious problems. Not that I didn't receive threats, I did. But whenever a threat was uttered at me after that I met it with extreme prejudice.

It was no surprise to many of my classmates that I went into the USMC after school.

[andyt]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

andyt andyt:

And where things are probably worse today is with with gangs - ie being bullied by a whole group. Hard to stand up to that by yourself.

Not at all.

Every group has a leader or a mouthpiece. Identify him (or her, as it may be), and then perform a very savage blitz attack when such a thing is least expected. Get him on the ground and continue the attack until someone drags you away. (That last part leaves a very important and lasting psychological impact).

Now you've sent a message to the weaker members of the group that you can isolate them and hurt them. Be sure to remind them of this fact as needed.

I know that works because that's what got me through high school.

My first two years in high school were hell.

In the first two months of my junior year I went on the warpath and after that I didn't have any more serious problems. Not that I didn't receive threats, I did. But whenever a threat was uttered at me after that I met it with extreme prejudice.

It was no surprise to many of my classmates that I went into the USMC after school.

Sounds like a tough time. Your school sounds pretty savage. Didn't you have any allies at all?

[Choban]

andyt andyt:

Choban Choban:

I'm sure if Mom and Dad had to pay up $100 everytime their kid hit someone things would change.

I'm not so sure at all. To what ages would you apply this? 6 yr olds giving each other a smack? Two 14 yr olds having a consensual fight? Or are you going to call out CSI each time to fully investigate the incident before giving the ticket. Things are often not so clear as this case.

Simple fact is that nothing tried so far has worked to eliminate or even really reduce the problem, a consentual fight is one thing and I have seen charges laid agianst the winner in my school days, bullying is a seperate matter.

Kids are killing themselves and each other over this issue so yes I think such drastic measures are required, I'm not talking CSI, but alot of schools have a constable available. Everyone has an opinion, no one has a solution, and of course there has to be due process for it to work, such as filed reports and statements but if it saves lives I'm all for it.

[andyt]

Choban Choban:

if it saves lives I'm all for it.

Me too. I doubt if yours is the best solution, and I doubt we'll ever find a perfect one. I guess it couldn't hurt, as long as it was part of a larger scheme, people don't just wash their hands and think they've addressed the problem. Bullying definitely needs to be taken back to the bullies family, tho I'm not sure that legally bullying the family is the answer.

[BartSimpson]

andyt andyt:

Sounds like a tough time. Your school sounds pretty savage. Didn't you have any allies at all?

I'd done a chunk of my growing up on Cape Cod and I fit in just fine there. In summer 1978 my family moved to Sacramento and I started high school and it was like throwing a lamb to the wolves. My accent, clothing, habits, and mannerisms were all attenuated to the East Coast and that did not fit in to the long-haired, jeans wearing, disco loving, pot smoking crowd at my high school.

I made a few friends - two of which are still close after more than 30 years - but mostly I tried to avoid the trouble that kept coming after me. I had red hair, wore glasses, was literate with good grades, and I was polite. None of which were acceptable to the majority of my classmates.

Add to this I had an authoritarian old-school father who blamed me for anything that happened at school and I was between a rock and a hard place.

What did it for me was summer of 1980 my father went on one of his rampages and came after me for some trivial offense and I laid him out cold with one punch.

Having conquered the worst monster in my life it was easy to start dealing with the others.

As I said, my warpath lasted only about two months. After that the morons knew to leave me alone and my grades went up. They went after other victims and when I would find out about it I then started defending those people, too.

It'd be nice if I did so for purely altruistic reasons, but the fact of the matter is that at that point I was just spoiling for a fight. Oddly, when you want to have a fight with a bully you just can't get them to cooperate.

Inadvertently I made school tolerable for some people and that was a good thing.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

andyt andyt:

And where things are probably worse today is with with gangs - ie being bullied by a whole group. Hard to stand up to that by yourself.

Not at all.

Every group has a leader or a mouthpiece. Identify him (or her, as it may be), and then perform a very savage blitz attack when such a thing is least expected. Get him on the ground and continue the attack until someone drags you away. (That last part leaves a very important and lasting psychological impact).

Now you've sent a message to the weaker members of the group that you can isolate them and hurt them. Be sure to remind them of this fact as needed.

I know that works because that's what got me through high school.

My first two years in high school were hell.

In the first two months of my junior year I went on the warpath and after that I didn't have any more serious problems. Not that I didn't receive threats, I did. But whenever a threat was uttered at me after that I met it with extreme prejudice.

It was no surprise to many of my classmates that I went into the USMC after school.

I set myself on fire as a practical joke at a party one time. Word went around school like wildfire. The one goof at school I had a problem with suddenly decided I was too crazy to keep messing with.

[Zipperfish]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

The young man I'm instructing in a particular skill has had fewer problems at school since he punched one of his tormentors in the throat.

Stopping bullying is actually primarily mental, in my opinion. They prey on those that lack confidence. The class bully was handing around a nasty note about someone and my son wouldn't pass it on. You'd think that would put him in the bully's sights, but it didn't. Bullies are normally cowards, so now he steers clear of my son because my son stood up to him.


I did tell my son that sometime you may be cornered and there may be no way out and if you are convinced that you are about to get hit, then pick the main guy, throw the first one and get him right in the nose.

[BartSimpson]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

I set myself on fire as a practical joke at a party one time. Word went around school like wildfire. The one goof at school I had a problem with suddenly decided I was too crazy to keep messing with.

My friend Chris got beat up by a lowrider and I burned the lowrider's prized car in the school parking lot by busting in the driver's side window and tossing in a highway flare. When he went after Chris for doing it I stepped up and informed him that I had done it and then asked him what he wanted to do about it? I said that if he wanted to start something with me I was willing to put him to an end. He told me I'd go to jail and I said, "And when I'm 25 I'll get out of jail and you'll still be dead. I can live with that."

There was a bunch of bluster and he dropped it. I forget the guy's name but he was the only blonde-haired Mexican I've ever met.

[Zipperfish]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

I set myself on fire as a practical joke at a party one time. Word went around school like wildfire. The one goof at school I had a problem with suddenly decided I was too crazy to keep messing with.

I grew up in some tough neighbourhoods. Guitar did the trick for me. If you were in a happening band, then chances are that you brought some decent-looking girls to the party, and there's no social standing to be gained from beating up the guitar player.

[BartSimpson]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

I did tell my son that sometime you may be cornered and there may be no way out and if you are convinced that you are about to get hit, then pick the main guy, throw the first one and get him right in the nose.

Throat. Punch him in the throat and the fight is over. Period.

[Lemmy]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

As I said, my warpath lasted only about two months. After that the morons knew to leave me alone and my grades went up. They went after other victims and when I would find out about it I then started defending those people, too.

That's when you began wearing the cape and spandex tights. The hollowing out of the Bart-cave began the following spring.

[BartSimpson]

Lemmy Lemmy:

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

As I said, my warpath lasted only about two months. After that the morons knew to leave me alone and my grades went up. They went after other victims and when I would find out about it I then started defending those people, too.

That's when you began wearing the cape and spandex tights. The hollowing out of the Bart-cave began the following spring.

Hate to say, but I came really close to becoming what I'd hated.

Is it okay to bully the bullies? At the time, for me, it was a near license to kill and I went way overboard. I'm seriously glad I made it through that phase without a criminal record.

[Lemmy]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

Is it okay to bully the bullies?

Absolutely. 99% of the people I've seen punched in my lifetime had it coming. An essential lesson in life is learning that, when you do stupid shit or run your mouth or pick on people for sport, you're gonna get smacked. The sooner in life that you take that shot to the yap (or throat) the better.

[BartSimpson]

Lemmy, I appreciate your point of view, but I was just out for vengeance and, after a while, I was getting a sadistic rush out of tormenting and humiliating bullies.

I was doing the right thing for the wrong reasons.